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Need
for Speed ProStreet

Score:
8.5 / 10

When
Need For Speed took it to the street first in Underground, then in Most Wanted
followed by Carbon, the car racing franchise reached a new level of excitement
and greatness that elevated Need For Speed to the top of the car racing genre.
For whatever reason, Electronic Arts decided to take the one element that Need
For Speed did extremely well, street racing, and shifted gear in its newest
rendition, ProStreet, repositioning the racing onto a much more structured
worldwide circuit that seems somewhat constricted with its sometimes
closed-course racing.

Gone
are the total openness and even the “naughty” nature of illegal and
downright criminal racing that branded the last three versions of the franchise,
to the lament of many Need For Speed motorheads everywhere. However, while
it’s a questionable tactic by EA to totally revamp the focus of Need For Speed
from its popular street racing roots, as gamers would have probably been happy
with a sequel to the very good Carbon, ProStreet and its more structured racing
events isn’t a bad alternative.

What
ProStreet suffers most from ironically is not its performance under the hood,
because it’s revved up where it matters most, with very good racing events,

including
those requiring drift, grip and speed expertise, along with improved tuning
features and the usual good controls. No, it’s the too-close similarity to
other racing games that takes the street out of Need For Speed and creates just
another good racing title not too different at first appearance from
Microsoft’s own Project Gotham Racing. It was that street element in

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Need
For Speed, just like Burnout’s crashing gameplay, that stood out amongst the
racing game crowd.

Many
of ProStreet’s features, though, elevate the game from the run-of-the-mill
pack. Drag racing is a great event, sure to delight the thrill-seeking racing
gamer with adrenaline-boosting battles of pure speed: one car against the other,
the fastest to the finish line wins all. In order to become a drag champion,
gamers must tune their cars to their highest performance levels, and with the
new Blueprints feature along with Autosculpting, you can design that ultimate
auto.

Performance-wise,
this game is a two-way street. On the one side, it really isn’t that difficult
to finish first in race event after race event. But crossing over the other
side, there are certain races that require an inordinate amount of car-handling
skill due to ProStreet’s new physics engine to avoid losing control and
totaling a vehicle in spectacular car-flipping fashion. There’s a delicate
balance of not too difficult with just hard enough to keep gamers on the road to
glory while still inducing a few beads of sweat to appear on their brow.

For
the rest of ProStreet’s experiences, gamers will be racing in “organized”
race days, with multiple events to prove their savvy in. If gamers do well,
they’ll face off in a “boss” battle before moving to the next day’s
worth of events in another worldwide locale, again with the final goal being to
defeat a “boss” on the gamer’s journey to becoming the king of
“street” racers.

Need
For Speed as a franchise, although giving a solid on-track performance in
ProStreet, might want to consider a U-turn and returning back the street racing
that made playing a Need For Speed title so titillating. There are still chills
and thrills to be found in ProStreet’s more organized “underground” racing
series, though, as the racing action still very much fills the need for speed
for racing gamers.